DVD REVIEW: "The Nanny Diaries"

Scarlett Johansson and Nicholas Reese Art

As I watched the opening moments of "The Nanny Diaries," I thought the film's two writer-directors, former documentarians Shari Springer Berman and Robert Pulcini, who co-wrote "American Splendor," the brilliant biopic of Harvey Pekar, had made a brilliant decision by refocusing the movie on anthropology. They adapted this movie from the best-selling novel by Emma McLaughlin and Nicola Kraus, two women not far removed from the society they depicted. They were child-psychology majors who put themselves through school by working as nannies for the uber-rich in Manhattan's Upper East Side. They threw all their experiences into one giant pot, stirred it, baked it and came out with a book in which one family becomes the composite of all their horrors. The point of the book, I think, was to show that these privileged women could be dragged down to the level of slaves by the nanny culture.

Anthropology, of course, is the study of cultures. So Berman and Pulcini make their heroine, Annie Braddock (Scarlett Johansson), a college graduate with a degree in anthropology who now must find a way to make a living in this cruel world. Her mother (Donna Murphy), who scrimped and saved to put her through school so Annie would have better (read that "make more money") life and wants her daughtet to enter the world of high finance. This leaves Annie lost and confused (Johansson plays Annie as a pouty-mouth bore with absolutely no grounding).

This leads to some outstanding opening moments. The first is when Annie strolls through the Museum of Natural History looking at dioramas of various cultures, real and imagined (the imagined ones include several species of New York career women). The second moment comes right after this when Annie sits forlonely in Central Park contemplating the possibilities of a career as a bag lady and spots a young boy (Nicholas Reese Art) about to be run down by a distracted guy on a motorized scooter. Annie dashes out, grabs the boy, Grayer, and saves him from being severely injured. Just then Grayer's mother (the marvelous Laura Linney) appears on the scene and, instead of thanking Annie for saving her son's life, she winds up congratulating herself for finding the nanny she needs to replace one who just left unexpectedly. This introduces us to the culture the anthropologist should have the opportunity to study for the rest of the film. In fact, Annie annoints the woman with the antropological label Mrs. X.

Unfortunately, that doesn't happen. Instead of the study of a unique culture or even a depiction of culture clashes, we get another version of "The Devil Wears Prada" in which a slave-driving woman dominates the innocent young girl in her employ. I'm not the first to make the comparison. When "Prada" appeared as a novel, it was compared to "Diaries." But because "Prada" made it to the screen first, the movie comparisons are reversed. There is one major difference, however. Miranda in "Prada" is the master of all she surveys, male and female alike. Mrs. X, however, is the master of only her nanny and her compulsive shopping habits. She is completely subjugated by her cruel, philandering husband (Paul Giamatti, completely wasted in a one-dimensional part) as well as the culture to which she wants to be a part of. But the movie doesn't explore the cultural part (except in one neat scene in which, during a group therapy session for these uptight mothers, they must confront their nannies) as much as it does the soap opera part.

So we're left with a story in which Grayer is a monster when we meet him, but does an immediate 180-degree turn because (I think) Annie gives him a hug. We're left with a story in which Annie meets a bland guy (Chris Evans) in Mrs. X's apartment building whose sole purpose in the film is to offer Annie a permanent position in her newfound life, which further dilutes the possibility of satire. We're left with a story in which Annie lies to her mother, telling her she really is a Wall Street trainee, but then must confess in a moment of prefabricated crisis designed only to promote this moment of truthtelling. And we're left with the story of how all this promotes separation from Annie's longtime best friend (Alicia Keyes).

If this wasn't enough, just to make sure we know this movie is striving for nothing more than "safe" and "cute," the filmmakers throw in a furry puppy near the end.

It's a shame because the movie could have been so much more, even much more than the book from which it was adapted. There is a reference early on that Annie's father, never seen in the film, currently lives in a double-wide in Pennsylvania and now here is Annie ensconced in a tony Manhattan apartment. But that is the problem: The movie just mentions this when it should have explored it. Now I do suspect, from those early scenes, that kind of exploration was exactly what Berman and Pulcini had planned, until some Hollywood "suit" in his paneled office panicked and told them to go in the direction of safe instead of smart.

Grade: C-